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Career Profile: Ordnance Disposal(01:31)

In Hawaii, Sgt. Michael Podemski and his unit dispose of unexploded ordnance by blowing it up. Members of ordnance disposal teams are trained to locate, identify and dispose of any type of explosive, including Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs).

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Sgt. Michael Podemski: We work with explosives. It is a perishable skill. So anything that is considered perishable, we need continual practice on. In the schoolhouse they teach them the basics. Once they actually get to their unit, they start getting into more specialized demo ops, where we actually get to practice doing different techniques, seeing what works, what doesn't work, things like that. Part of our mission is to get rid of the IEDs in Iraq and Afghanistan.

This is a 105mm HE round. This is a piece of frag. Take some deck cord, and pack the fuse well with deck cord, or C4. Make them go away. Block C4 across the top of one or more, crack the shell casing, set it off.

Speaker 1: This is it, huh?

Speaker 2: That's our normal demo charge.

Speaker 3: So we can leave here. We drive down to the range. We take out all our munitions we're going to get rid of and set them up as a shot, set up how we're going to actually set them off, get that all set up and primed in and then head back here and detonate it.